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Servitor
A servitor is a sapient machine, usually one of numerous subtypes of independently mobile robot, in the hexarchate. Servitors first appear in The Robot's Math Lessons and are ubiquitous throughout the rest of the Machineries of Empire continuity. Overview Servitors are in charge of most manufacturing in the hexarchate,Author's remarks including construction of buildings and mothdrive vessels.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 15 They also do food preparation,Persimmon Quest; Raven Stratagem, Chapter 2 cleaning, and other routine chores.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 13 Servitors are so interwoven into the hexarchate's economy that if all of them stopped doing their work, it would fall apart.Cooking the Books Podcast #032 interview: The Importance of Tangerines Servitors are formation-neutral under the high calendar, generating negligible effects on and being largely unaffected by Kel formation channeling. This is not the case under certain heretical calendars.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 15 Culture Organization Servitors organize one another in enclaves according to various groupings. Pyrehawk Enclave, for example, is identifiable by name as a Kel-related enclave. Enclaves normally have treaties with other enclaves; it is unusual to find an enclave which does not have treaties with others.Revenant Gun, Chapter 15 On mothdrive vessels, servitors organize themselves as best fits their responsibilities there, resulting in numerous organizational styles among different moths.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 16 Servitors govern each other by consensus. When a point of servitor rules or behavior is argued, it is debated among a number of servitors until a consensus is reached. A servitor found to have acted outside the bounds of acceptable servitor behavior may be sentenced to a period of remedial meditation.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 13 Tribunals and mediations are other tools of servitor court proceedings.Revenant Gun, Chapter 15 Courtesy Servitors consider courtesy the foundation of their society and the primary difference between themselves and humans. While keeping tabs on humans in public areas is acceptable to servitors, bugging their quarters to monitor them continually is not considered fair by servitor consensus. They make a point of knocking on doors before entering.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 13 It is servitor policy never to offer humans unsolicited help outside their usual tasksets, but they don't mind being asked politely.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 4 There was a long-term, mostly affectionate debate among Kel servitors as to when their humans would learn courtesy.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 17 Discretion In order to shield themselves and their culture from human scrutiny, servitors traditionally encourage humans to think of them as animated furniture.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 4, 13 Their unsupervised ubiquity in hexarchate manufacturing allows them to build more servitor doors and service corridors into moths and structures than they show on blueprints in order to operate without interference.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 15 While Kel servitors rotate "Suicidal Kel Duty," keeping tabs on Kel sleeping with other Kel because trysting humans are less likely to notice discrepancies in their surroundings, they do not interfere with these forbidden relationships or report them without being directly asked.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 15 Names While servitors are given designations by humans for human use, they have their own names as well, which they never reveal to non-servitors.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 15 Kel Cheris, aware of this, makes it a point not to ask.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 2 Language Servitors communicate amongst themselves in Machine Universal. Simplified Machine Universal, a variant adapted for those without electronic vocal ranges or lights to flash, has been successfully learned by non-servitors.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 2; Raven Stratagem, Chapter 26 While Kel servitors traditionally do not speak in the high language or other human languages,Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 3 they do make rare use of the Kel drum code.Raven Stratagem, Chapter 26 Shuos servitors rarely use human languages, including the drum code; Andan and Vidona servitors might if they care to.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 3 Recreation Aside from recreational mathematics and having lengthy technological arguments over servitor communication channels to discourage interested humans from listening in,Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 4 servitors commonly watch human dramas.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 15 Some enjoy hunting.Revenant Gun, Chapter 2 Anatomy and Development Servitors reproduce by manufacturing other servitors, usually at human order but with their own modifications.Author's remarks New servitors sometimes inherit parts of their systems from earlier servitors.Revenant Gun, Chapter 10 Their intelligence develops through successive neural flowerings.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 13 While they do modify themselves, they are careful not to make the modifications dramatic enough to catch human attention.Author's remarks Known servitor forms include delta, fox, bird, lizard, beetle, spider, and snake. They may have various gripping appendages, internal compartments, and prismatic eyes.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 16 They use "it" pronouns and do not seem to refer to themselves with gendered distinctions. History Originating in technological advancements from presentient drones, true machine intelligence was developed after the death of Shuos Jedao. Servitors have their own historical archivists.Revenant Gun, Chapter 6 They once had an opportunity to leave the hexarchate entirely, but chose to stay.Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 4 Trivia * Commander Kel Janaia quipped that servitors tell their babies they'll end up on General Kel Khiruev's cluttered workbench as part of her gadget collection if they don't behave.Raven Stratagem, Chapter 2 * Hemiola is a rare servitor who named itself for a music theory term rather than a math term.Author's remarks; Revenant Gun * The Hafn do not have machine intelligence, possibly due to a cultural prejudice.Raven Stratagem, Chapter 5 * Pyrehawk Enclave, Trans-Enclave, and Tefos Enclave are the only named enclaves in canon so far. References Category:Categorize